The problem Esther and Mordecai faced was that the king, simply by executive fiat, couldn’t cancel the first edict since the laws of the Medes and Persians were unalterable. In modern democratic nations, legislatures can reverse decisions and revoke laws, and the supreme court of the land can even declare laws unconstitutional, but not so in the ancient despotic Persian Empire. The voice of the king was the law of the land, and the king could do no wrong.
The king couldn’t legally revoke his edict, but he could issue a new decree that would favor the Jews. The new decree would let everybody in the empire know that the king wanted his people to have a different attitude toward the Jews and look favorably upon them. The citizens didn’t have to hire a lawyer to explain the new edict to them. You can be sure they got the message: Don’t attack the Jews on March 7.
Since Mordecai was now prime minister, it was his job to draft the new decree. What he did was give the Jews permission to defend themselves against anybody who tried to kill them and take their property. There were many people in the empire like Haman, who hated the Jews, wanted to destroy them, and get their hands on their wealth. The new decree allowed the Jews to assemble and defend themselves, but they were not allowed to be the aggressors.
Scholars don’t agree on the translation of verse 11. The Authorized Version gives the impression that the edict allowed the Jews to destroy the wives and children of their attackers and plunder their spoil, and the NASB seems to agree with this interpretation. The NIV connects “women and children” with the Jews being attacked and doesn’t suggest that the Jews killed the women and children of their attackers. I prefer the NIV translation.
If you read 3:11–13, you will see the similarity of the wording of the two decrees. Mordecai used the “official language” of the government, because legal statements must be expressed in legal language. This language may seem strange to outsiders, but without it we would have confusion and misinterpretation. You can’t write the law the way you write a poem or a recipe.
According to 8:9, the new edict was written on the twenty-third day of the third month, which on our calendar would be June 25, 474 BC. (Remember, the Jewish calendar begins with the month of April.) The first decree was issued on April 17 (3:12). Thus, about seventy days had passed since Haman had declared war on the Jews. “D Day” for the Jews was March 7 (3:13). Therefore, the people had about eight months to get ready.
We must pause and consider whether it was really ethical for Mordecai to give the Jews the authority to kill and loot. People who deny the divine inspiration of the Bible like to point to the various “massacres” in Scripture as evidence that the God of the Bible is “a bully.” Imagine worshipping a god that commanded the slaughter of whole populations!
First, let’s consider the edict that Ahasuerus issued, for that’s where all the trouble started. If it was wicked for Mordecai to tell the Jews to defend themselves, then it was even more wicked for Haman and Ahasuerus to tell the Persians to attack the Jews in the first place! Self-defense isn’t a crime, but genocide definitely is. Do these critics approve of the king’s edict? I certainly hope not! Well, if they don’t approve of the king’s decree, which permitted murder, then how can they disapprove of Mordecai’s decree, which allowed the Jews the right to defend themselves? Better that Haman’s decree had never been issued, but since it was published, better that Mordecai disarmed it by issuing his decree.
Now, let’s look at the record in chapter 9, where you discover three important facts: The Jews killed only those who attacked them; they killed only the men (9:6, 12, 15); and they didn’t lay hands on the loot, although they had the right to do so (vv. 10, 15–16). The fact that the Jews killed 800 men in the city of Shushan alone (vv. 6, 15) proves that there were many Persians just waiting for the opportunity to attack God’s people. (It’s estimated that there were probably half a million people in the capital city.)
The total number of the slain was 75,000 (v. 16) out of a population of perhaps 100 million people. But the fact that more than 75,000 people were prepared to slaughter defenseless Jews shows how many of the king’s people hated God’s people. And the fact that these people were even willing to attack when they knew the Jews would protect themselves is proof that anti-Semitism was very strong throughout the empire. The critics say it was wrong for the Jews to kill 75,000 would-be murderers. Would it have been better if the 75,000 Persians had killed ten times as many Jews?
Mordecai’s decree was in complete harmony with God’s covenant with Abraham: “I will bless those who bless you, and I will curse him who curses you” (Gen. 12: nkjv). Isaac also would have agreed with Mordecai, for when Isaac blessed Jacob, he said, “Cursed be everyone who curses you, and blessed be those who bless you” (27: nkjv). In addition, God promised Moses, “I will be an enemy to your enemies and an adversary to your adversaries” (Ex. 23: nkjv). And don’t forget that quotation from Dr. J. Vernon McGee: “The Jew has attended the funeral of every one of the nations that tried to exterminate him.”
It’s one thing to write a liberating new edict and quite another thing to get the message out to the people. Mordecai put the secretaries to work translating and copying the decree, and then he sent the couriers to carry the good news to the people in the various provinces of the empire. The couriers “hastened” because they were “pressed on by the king’s commandment” (Est. 8: kjv). The NIV translates it “spurred on by the king’s command.”
If only the church today were like those secretaries and couriers! How we need to tell the peoples of the world in their own languages the good news of salvation through faith in Jesus Christ! The King has commanded us, and we must go, but for some reason we linger. If a group of pagan scribes and messengers, without modern means of transportation and communication, could take Mordecai’s decree to an entire empire, how much more should Christian workers be able to take Christ’s gospel to a lost world!
Ever since the fall of Adam, “the law of sin and of death” has been in force in this world (Rom. 8:2; 5:12–21), and God will not rescind that law. The wages of sin is still death (Rom. 6:23). Through the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ, God put another law into effect, “the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus” (8:2). God obeyed the law of sin and death when He gave His Son, Jesus, to bear our sins and die on the cross. But then God raised Him from the dead and put a new decree into effect that makes it possible for sinners to be saved. Now He wants us to put that good news into every tongue and take that good news to every nation.
This chapter begins with Queen Esther in tears (Est. 8:3), but it ends with the Jews rejoicing and feasting (vv. 15–17). Happiness of one kind or another is mentioned in this paragraph at least seven times. (This is the eighth feast mentioned in the book of Esther.) The Jews had been mourning and fasting, but now they were ecstatic with joy.
The thing that made the difference was not the writing of the decree or even its distribution in the various provinces. The thing that made the difference was the fact that the Jews believed the decree. It was their faith in Mordecai’s word that changed their lives. They had hope, joy, and peace because they had faith in what the prime minister said. “Now may the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, that you may abound in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit” (Rom. 15: nkjv).
The statement that “many of the people of the land became Jews” (Est. 8:17) is variously interpreted. The obvious meaning is that many Gentiles in the empire forsook their pagan religions and became Jewish proselytes. But since the Jews were far from Jerusalem and the ministry of the priests, these “converts” couldn’t be initiated fully into the Jewish faith. They became what were known later as “Godfearers” or “worshippers of God” (Acts 10:2; 16:14; 18:7).
I think the phrase means that many of the Gentiles in the empire sided with the Jews and acted as though they were Jews. They weren’t ashamed to be identified with the Jews even though the Jews had enemies.
After President Reagan was shot, when he was being prepared for surgery, he jokingly said to the medical team, “I hope all of you are Republicans.” One of the doctors replied, “Mr. President, today all of us are Republicans.” That was the attitude of many of the people in the Persian Empire when Mordecai’s edict was published: “Today, all of us are Jews.”
The book of Esther opens with the Jews keeping a very low profile, so much so that Esther and Mordecai wouldn’t even confess their nationality. But now the Jews are proud of their race and so happy with what God had done that they were attracting others to their faith! Even the pagan Gentiles could see that God was caring for His people in a remarkable way.
Evangelist Billy Sunday said, “If you have no joy in your religion, there’s a leak in your Christianity somewhere.” If Christian believers today manifested more of the joy of the Lord, perhaps those outside the faith would be attracted to the church and be willing to consider the message of the gospel.
It’s worth trying.